km MO. ' Ammmo^ 



The Relations of the National and State Gov- 
ernments TO Advanced Education. 



BY 



ANDREW D.: WHITE. 



A Paper read before the National Educational Association, at Detroit, 

Aug. 5, 1874. 



BOSTON: 
OFFICE OF OLD AND NEW, 

143 Washington Street. 



TUE TBAliE SUrrLtF.T) ]!Y 

F. B. PERKINS, BUSINESS AGENT. 
LONDON; SAMPSON LOW & CO., 188 FLEET STREET. 

1874.- 



Rev, James Martine 



..i^.D., the distin- 



guished metaphysician .^a theologian, has en- 



gaged to furnish exc 



New" a series of pape's on 



usively to " Old and 



■'-> A 



^^ 



%^\\t Yansictttaml | etnunent in ^ifltfliaii/' 



THE I^XJBJECXS ARE: 



THE HISTORICAL CHRIST. 

RELIGION ; NATURAL, REVEALED 
AND APOCALYPTIC. 



GOD IN NATURE. 

GOD IN HUMANITY. 

GOD IN HISTORY. t. , 

I ; THE MESSIANIC APOCALYPSE. 

THE CHURCH AND ITS §RETEN- 

SIOUS CLAIMS. : '^^^^ PAULINE AND JOHANNINE DOC- 

TRINE OF CHRIST'S PERSON. 
THE PROTESTANT THEORY OF AU- 
THORITY. 

THE HUMAN AND THE DIVINE ELE- 
MENTS IN HISTORY. 



THE eENSE OF SIN AND THE DOC- 
TRjNES of REDEMPTION. 

THE iACRAMENTAL SUPERSTITION. 



Readers who wish, can subscribe for the 
whole series, sent to ot a address, for $4.00. 



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THE RELATIONS 

OF THE 

I^ATIO^AL AND STATE G O YEEE"ME]^TS 

TO 

ADVANCED EDUOATIOK 



A Paper read before the National Educational Association at Detroit, Aug. 6,'i874. 



Br ANDREW D. WPIITE, 

PKESIDENT OV COENELL. UNIVEESITT. 

Reprinted from the October dumber of Old and New. 

[This address, which was read at Detroit, attracted the attention and 
cordial thanks of the large assembty there of gentlemen connected with 
public education. The bodj* of men who are engaged in State universities, 
in norilial schools, and other institutions supported 'by States, is now con- 
siderable. These men do not care to be set aside by an epigram, as being 
the mere tools of political parties, and as of no account except as political 
make-weights. They were, therefore, especially glad to hear a defence of 
public education in the higher walks of education. 

On the other hand, the address, even as partially reported, has been 
challenged almost, of course, by the sectarian journals. For these reasons 
we are glad to publish, for consideration now and for pi-eservation, from 
the author's manuscript, a much fuller report than any which has yet ap- 
peared. The demand for it among all persons interested in the subject is 
so large, that this special edition is reprinted in pamphlet form. — Eds. 
Old and New.] 

Among all the modern nations, two aroused the world's wonder by its 

stand pre-eminent for faith in public political and social triumphs, 

education, and for energy in providing Next I name the United States, 

it. where, in sight of all mankind, pop- 

Of these, I name first the German ular education is lifting a nation above 

nation. In the midst of great calami- all the efforts of demagogues in the 

ties and trials, and long years of hard field, in the senate-house, and in the 

work, and under administrations eco- press. 

nomical to parsimony, she has devel- In one thing these two nations have 

oped a system, which, for half a adopted the same policy, and obtained 

century, has won the admiration of the same results. Each has made 

the world by its intellectual triumphs, abundant provision for primary and 

and which, in the past ten years, has secondary education in public schools, 



new "¥€«« p^L- "®^ 

ii4 EXCHANGE, 



476 



The National and State Governments 



and both have found in this a source 
of triumphs both in peace and war, 
which have placed theiri in the fore- 
most rank among modern nations. 

But in the other half of the sys- 
tem, — in provision for advanced edu- 
cation, in high scientific and industrial 
schools and universities, — they have 
followed courses directly opposite, and 
with directly opposite results. 

Germany has carried out her fun- 
damental principle logically. Having 
started with the idea that the people 
of a nation should provide for the 
education of the nation, it has stopped 
at no imaginary line : it has provided 
for the education of the whole peo- 
ple, — for the young, in primary and 
secondary schools ; for those more 
advanced, in technical schools and 
universities. The result is now before 
the world. 

Forth from these institutions have 
come a majority of the greatest 
leaders of modern thought and prac- 
tice, — not only great theologians 
and lawyers and physicians and his- 
torians, and general scholars, but 
great engineers, physicists, chemists, 
and naturalists, — strong in develop- 
ing the material resources of the 
nation. Kor have the}' done less for 
liberty than for civilization. 

In a State whose central adminis- 
tration is thoroughly orthodox, and 
exercises strong political control, *hese 
universities are strongholds of free- 
dom in politics and religion. In the 
halls of the Universitj'' of Berlin, 
within a stone's-throw of the palace 
of the rigidly orthodox Frederick 
William IV., might be heard during 
his entire reign the free utterances of 
men opposed to every religious or 
political doctrine which the king 
thought essential. From the palace 
window, whore the Emperor William 
loves to stand, can be seen in the 



university lecture-rooms, on the oppo- 
site side of the street, professors put- 
ting forth ideas fatal to absolute mon- 
archy. 

Bear in mind, too, that this is not 
the result of centuries of work, — a 
result impossible in a new country. 

Though, some of the German uni- 
versities are on very old foundations, 
they have been remodelled to suit 
modern needs, and are in reality new : 
the greatest of all, the University of 
Berlin, is j'ounger than the majority 
of our American colleges which have 
most reputation ; and the greatest of 
her institutions for advanced instruc- 
tion in the applied sciences have 
grown up within twenty years. 

The result has been great, politically, 
intellectually, and morally. These 
universities, supported by the whole 
people, and for the whole people, 
stand far above any others in the 
world. 

The United States, agreeing with 
Germany in the general line of her 
public school policy and primary edu- 
cation, has pursued an entirely' differ- 
ent path in regard to university policy 
and advanced education. 

While making primary and second- 
ary education a matter of National and 
State concern, it has left its advanced 
education, in the main, to various 
religious sects. It has allowed an 
utterly illogical imaginary line to be 
drawn, below which the State pro- 
vides for education gladly and fully, 
above which she turns the whole 
matter over to the sectarian spirit of 
the country. While the United States 
has pushed the roots of its public 
school system down into the needs and 
feelings of the whole people, and thus 
obtained a deep rich soil, which has 
given sturdy growth, it has pushed 
the roots of advanced education down 
into the multitude of scattered sects, 



and Advanced Education. 



ill 



and has obtained a soil wretchedly 
thin, and a growth miserably scant. 

For the first result of this policy as 
to advanced education was, that, as 
sects multiplied, the so-called colleges 
and universities multiplied. Now, 
while the main condition of primary 
education is diffusion of resources, the 
main condition of advanced education 
is concentration of resources. Eng- 
land sees this, and has but four uni- 
versities ; imperial Prussia sees it, and 
has eight; the United States has not 
seen it, and the last Report of the 
Bureau of Education shows that we 
have over three hundred and sixty in- 
stitutions bearing the name of ''col- 
lege " and " university." 

The most evident result has been 
the impoverishment of the whole sys- 
tem. With very few exceptions, these 
■colleges and universities are without 
any thing approaching complete facul- 
ties, without libraries giving any idea 
of the present condition of knowl- 
edge, without illustrative collections 
for stud}', without laboratories for ex- 
periment, with next to no modern 
apparatus and instruments. This is 
true of the whole country ; but it is 
more sadly true of those States out- 
side of the original thirteen. 

The next striking result has been a 
lasting injury to those engaged in the 
work of advanced instruction. Many 
noble men stand in the faculties of 
those colleges and universities, — men 
who would do honor to any institution 
of advanced learning in the world. 
After much intercourse with univer- 
sity professors of various nations, I 
feel assured that I have never seen 
any who surpass in natural strength 
and earnestness very many in our own 
country ; and I have heard this re- 
marked more than once by thoughtful 
American fellow-students, while sit- 
ting in foreign university lecture- 



rooms. These men of ours would, 
under a better system, develop admi- 
rably the intellectual treasures of our 
people and the material resources of 
our country ; but cramped by want 
of books, want of apparatus, want of 
every thing needed in advanced in- 
struction, cramped, above all, by the 
spirit of tlie sectarian college system, 
verj'' many of them have been par- 
alyzed. 

I know whereof I speak. Within 
the last twenty j'ears I have seen 
much of these institutions, and within 
the last seven years I have made it a 
duty to watch them closely ; and I 
freely confess that my observations 
have saddened me. Go from one 
great State to another, in every one 
you shall find that this unfortunate 
sj'stem has produced the same miser- 
able results, — in the vast majority of 
our States not a single college or uni- 
versity worthy of the name; only o, 
multitude of little sectarian schools 
with pompous names and poor equip- 
ments, each doing its best to prevent 
the establishment of any institution 
broader and better. 

The traveller arriving in our great 
cities generally lands in a railway 
station costing more than all the 
university edifices of the State ; and 
he sleeps in a hotel in which there is 
embarked more capital than in the 
entire university endowment for mil- 
lions of people. 

He visits asylums for lunatics, idiots, 
deaf, dumb, and blind, nay, even for the 
pauper and criminal, and he finds them 
palaces : he visits the college bualdings 
for young men of sound mind and ear- 
nest purpose, the dearest treasures of 
the State, and he generally finds them 
in vile barracks. He inspects those 
asylums for men and women who are 
never more to be useful, and finds 
them provided with most perfect sys- 



478 



The National and State Governments 



terns of ventilation : he visits the 
dormitories, recitation and lecture 
rooms, where live and move the young 
men who are to make or mar the 
State, and he finds them with sys- 
tems of heating which vitiate the air, 
and with no ventilation. Examining 
still further, he finds that the inmates 
of the asylums have good food well 
prepared ; he finds the inmates of 
colleges generally supplied with poor 
food badly prepared ; he finds young 
men of sedentary and scholarly pur- 
suits living in families where vinegar 
and grease are combined by the worst 
cookery in the world to form a diet 
•which would destroy the stomachs of 
■wood-choppers. lujiufficient as intel- 
lectual training at most of these places 
is, the phj'sical training is much worse, 
for it tends to make the great body of 
students sickly and weak and morbid, 
rather than strong pioneers of good 
thoughts, and sturdy bulwarks against 
political folly. 

And, finally, there has come by the 
prevailing system a cramping of the 
intellectual development more unfor- 
tunate than that produced by poverty ; 
for, as these institutions drew their 
nutriment mainly from sectarian effort, 
the controlling idea became sect growth, 
and not individual growth. Asa result, 
each 3'^oung man heard only professors 
of his own sect, or those affiliated with 
it. His philosophy, his history, his 
literature, was cast in the sect mould. 
The main result was not so much to 
educate the young man's mind as to 
warp it. 

This was all the more natural be- 
cause the various sects sometimes 
found their colleges convenient asy- 
lums for their unsatisfactory pastors, 
and their professorships comfortable 
shelves for men not successful in their 
pulpits. This was rendered all the 
more easy by the current superstition, 



that muddiness betokens depth, and 
that, if a clergyman be a dull preacher, 
he is probably a profound scholar. The 
result of this was, that the really strong 
men holding professorships were some- 
times hampered by incompetent men, 
whose main function was to hear young 
men " parrot " text-books by rote in 
the recitation-room, and to denounce 
"science, falsely so called" in the 
chapel, varying these avocations by 
going around the country, denouncing 
every attempt at a better system as 
godless, and passing around the con- 
tribution-boxes iu behalf of the bad 
system they represented. 

Such is the main outline of the de- 
velopment of the American system of 
college instruction ; and, if its result is 
in the main unsatisfactory, its present 
condition is mortifying. 

This system of advanced education 
is now an old one. The time has ar- 
rived when it may be fully and fairly 
judged. It is not a new or young 
plant, as many fondly suppose : it 
has been developing more than two 
hundred years. By this time, if ever, 
we may expect a great, strong growth, 
a luxuriance in bloom and fruitage. 
But what do we see ? Let me sum 
up with a few facts universally ac- 
knowledged. As to universities, our 
prevailing sect system has failed in 
two hundred and fifty years to de- 
velop one which ranks with institu- 
tions bearing that name in the other 
great civilized nations, some of them 
of far more recent creation than our 
own. The University of Berlin is 
younger than a multitude of our 
American colleges : it was brought 
up to its highest pinnacle by a nation 
crushed by military disaster and by 
financial burdens ; yet no one will 
claim that we have an institution to 
compare with it. 

As to schools of mechanical and 



and j±dvanceU Education. 



479 



civil engineering, we are developing 
some which are doing excellent work; 
but we have not as yet one which will 
take rank with tlie multitude of such 
schools on the continent. To say 
notliing of such institutions as the 
French "ficole Polytechnique, we liave 
no advanced schools to compare with 
recent creations at Stuttgart, Carls- 
ruhe, and Zurich. 

As to laboratories, all these years 
of work in America, mainly shaped 
by the prevailing system, have failed 
to give us one to compare for a mo- 
ment with several recently erected at 
Leipsic, Berlin, Heidelberg, Munich, 
and elsewhere, b}^ government aid. 

As to museums of the mechanic arts, 
all our collections combined would be 
as the small dust in the balance, when 
compared to the Conservatoire des 
Arts et Metiers. 

As to art collections bearing on the 
various industries, if we were to add 
together all that our American system 
has accumulated, and multiply the sum 
by thousands, we should have nothing 
to approach the schools recently created 
by the English Government at South 
Kensington. As to various branches 
of instruction, we have man}' men in 
all departments equal to the best in 
Europe ; but, for want of a university 
system to give scope to their ambi- 
tion, they have almost entirely lacked 
opportunitj'. American students have 
been forced to pursue their most ad- 
vanced studies abroad. Even as to 
that which is nearest us, — no full 
professorship of American history 
exists in our land. To study this 
history, young men have gone to sit 
at the feet of Laboulaye at Paris, 
Neumann at Berlin, and Kingsley 
a*t English Cambridge. It is in view 
of such a meagre growth in over two 
hundred years, under the prevailing 
system, that I present the following, 



as the fundamental proposition of 
this paper : — 

The main provision for advanced 
education in the United States must 
be made by the people at large, act- 
ing through their National and State 
legislatures, to endow and maintain 
institutions for the higher instruc- 
tion, fully equipped, and free from 
sectarian control. 

And. first, I argue that the past his- 
tory and present condition of the higher 
education in the United States arouse 
a strong presumption in favor of mak- 
ing it a matter of public civil action, 
rather titan leaving it to the prevail- 
ing system of private sectarian action. 

The history already given certainly 
arouses a presumption against the ex- 
isting system; but that presumption is 
greatly strengthened by noticing what 
has been done, under the beginning of 
the plan I now advocate, — the plan 
under which the citizens of the various 
States of the .United States have taken 
advanced education into their con- 
trol. 

Look briefly over this history of a 
better effort. The first good attempt 
to give to this country a true universi- 
ty, as distinguished from the Ameri- 
can deterioration of the English col- 
lege, was made by State action in the 
creation of the University of Vir- 
ginia. 

The prevailing sectarian system 
profited not at all by this example. 
The great universities of Germanj' 
grew into their modern state, nur- 
series of the love of learning and the 
love of freedom ; but the sectarian 
college system of America went on 
multiplying the usual poor imitations 
of English colleges, when public civil 
action was again resorted to, and gave 
the beginning of another university: 
the combined bounty of the National 
and State Government, wisely admin- 



480 



The National and State Governments 



istered, gave to the country the Uni- 
versity of Michigan. 

As to scientific and technological 
instruction, our country waited for 
years after such advanced instruction 
was given in Europe : but there 
came onl^^ scattered and feeble efforts; 
and the first great and comprehensive 
system which gave a college for ap- 
plied science to every State in the 
Union was established by the con- 
gressional act of 18C2, supplemented 
by the various acts of the State legis- 
latures. 

As to the illustration of natural 
science, the one collection in the 
United States that has acknowledged 
rank throughout the world is the one 
fostered by the wise and careful boun- 
ty of the State of Massachusetts at 
Cambridge. 

And as to education in morals, 
that very education of what is best 
in man, which is claimed as the es- 
pecial raison d'etre of the prevailing 
sectarian system, the only institution 
which is generally recognized as 
strong enough to impress upon its 
whole teaching a sense of duty suffi- 
ciently deep to hold its own against 
the immoral tides of these times, the 
only one, which, when graduates of all 
other institutions fail, is, by common 
consent, appealed to, to give mana- 
gers to our railways who will not 
plunder, investigators of our mines 
who will not lie, negotiators with our 
Indians who will not cheat, is the 
Government College at West Point. 

But I argue next, that caref id jnih- 
lic provision by the people for their 
own system of advanced instruction 
is the only rcpuhliran and the only 
democratic method. 

While I hail with joy supplemen- 
tary private gifts when not used as 
fetters, I maintain that there can be 
no system more uarepublican than 



that by which a nation or a state, in 
consideration of a few hundreds of 
thousands of dollars, delivers over its 
system of advanced instruction to be 
controlled and limited by tlie dogmas 
and whimseys of living donors or dead 
testators. In more than one nation, 
fdead hands, stretching out from graves 
closed generations gone, have lain 
with a deadly chill upon institutions 
for advanced instruction during cen- 
turies. Moi'e than one institution in 
our own country has felt this grip 
and chill. Tlie progress of civiliza- 
tion in the Old World since the 
French Kevolution of 1789 has 
tended more and more to the building- 
up of its education in accordance with 
the needs of living men rather than 
the anticipations of dead men. My 
position is simply, that, if we ought 
to govern ourselves in any thing, we 
ought to govern ourselves in this; 
and that if, in matters of far less im- 
portance, we will not allow our rights, 
duties, and wants to be decided upon 
by this or that living man, we cer- 
tainly ought not, in a matter of such 
vast importance as the higher edu- 
cation of our children, to allow our 
rights, duties, and wants to be decided 
upon by this or that dead man. 

Again: I argue that p^iZ^/Zc provis- 
ion, that is the decision and provision 
hy each generation as to its oion ad- 
vanced education, is alone worthy of 
our dignity as citizens. 

What would be thought of a State 
which refused to build its State-house 
from its State treasury, and on the 
ostensible ground that private giving 
is good for the donor, and honorable 
to the State, begged individuals to 
build it ? Should we not have a re- 
sult exactly typical of what is exhib- 
ited in the prevailing system for 
advanced instruction ? We should 
probably, if fortunate enough to get 



and Advanced Education. 



481 



any thing at all, find, after a century, 
an edifice perfectly typical of what 
has been given us under our similar 
system in advanced education, — a 
Roman tower of brick here ; a Gothic 
spire of stone there ; a Greek pedi- 
ment of wood here; a Kenaissance 
cupola of iron there ; a Doric column 
of porphyry nest a Corinthian column 
of sandstone ; no fitting approaches, 
because no one had given any thing 
so humble ; halls too small, and door- 
ways too narrow, and windows askew 
in accordance with this or that dead. 
man's whimsey. 

But this is the least. Suppose 
that we really get our building thus 
constructed, what would, be thought 
of the policy which should leave the 
State building thus erected to be con- 
trolled forever, as to its occupancy 
and use, by living and dead donors, 
ancient and modern, and by their 
medley of ideas, religious and secular, 
forcible and feeble, crude and thought- 
ful, shrewd and absurd ? And, if this 
system is incompatible with State 
and National dignity as regards a 
mere pile of stone and mortar, how 
much more so, when there is con- 
cerned the building of an edifice 
made of the best brains and hearts of 
living men, and tlie control of a great 
system of advanced education, in all 
its branches, for the entire nation, 
for all generations ! 

Again : I argue that by ptchHc pro- 
vision can private gifts be best stim- 
ulated. 

We have had in our country many 
noble examples of munificence to- 
ward institutions for advanced in- 
struction ; but no one thing seems to 
have stimulated them so much as 
the public endowments, which have 
ayoused discussion, and afforded ob- 
jects to which citizens of all creeds 
could contribute as a patriotic duty. 
31 



' Take, as an example, the congres- 
sional grant of 1862, to national col- 
leges, for scientific and industrial in- 
struction. The recent reports of the 
United States Commissioner of Edu- 
cation show that gifts have been aggre- 
gated about these nuclei to the amount 
of over eight' million dollars. Let ma 
refer to an example within the Stat* 
of New York. The national grant 
was concentrated upon one institution, 
the Cornell University. This en- 
couraged thoughtful and liberal men 
to hope that something worthy of the 
State might be built upon that foun- 
dation ; and the result is, that in eight 
years there have been added to that 
original endowment private gifts to 
the value of over a million, five hun- 
dred thousand dollars ; and, so far as 
I can learn, none of these' gifts would 
have been made but for the nucleus 
afforded by the national grant. 

I argue next, that by liberal public 
grants alone can our private endow- 
ments be wisely directed or economi- 
cally aggregated. 

No one conversant with the' history 
of advanced instruction in this coun- 
try can have failed to note the inef- 
fably absurd way in which large gifts 
for advanced instruction have been 
frittered away under the pxevailing 
system. 

There is hardly a State in the 
Union where the sums, large and 
small, that have been scattered 
among a multitude of petty sectarian 
institutions called colleges and uni- 
versities, would not have produced 
one institution of great public value, 
had these gifts been directed to one 
object, and aggregated about one 
nucleus. 

Compare two Western States lying 
near each other, — Ohio and Michi- 
gan. The State of Ohio has had 
every advantage over its northern 



482 



The National and State Governments 



neighbor as to population, soil, wealth, 
communication with the seaboard, and 
priority of complete occupation ; but, 
as regards advanced education, it 
stumbled into tlie policy of scattered 
denominational colleges supported by 
sectarian beggary. 

The State of Michigan took its 
national grant, developed upon that 
a State University ; and from time 
to time its State legislature has 
added judiciously to it. Now look at 
the results. The gi-eat State of Ohio 
has within its borders not one college 
or university well equipped in any 
respect, — not one which rises above 
the third or fourth class. On the 
other hand, the State of Michigan has 
a noble university of the very first 
rank, witli over a thousand students ; 
and, what is of vast importance, the 
presence of such an institution has 
strengthened the whole system of pub- 
lic instruction throughout the State. 
No State has a more admirable series 
of primary schools and high schools ; 
and her normal school ranks among 
the best, aiid so does her agricul- 
tural college. The system has been 
pronounced by thoughtful men from 
other States the best in the Union ; 
and the whole secret of its excellence 
is, that, by wise and liberal legislation, 
stimulus and direction were given to 
private endowment. The difference 
between the two States I have named 
is, that in Michigan a jDublic endow- 
ment gave statesmanlike direction to 
private endowment ; while in Ohio all 
was frittered away and scattered be- 
tween the clamors and intrigues of 
sects and localities. 

So much for the direction of endow- 
ments : look now at their aggregation. 
Take the facts as they stand : I will 
mention cases well known. A weak 
denominational college in one of our 
States has received from a friend a 



great telescope worthy of the greatest 
institution in the world; but hardly 
any one else has given the institution 
any thing : there is no gift of a well- 
equipped observatory, or provision for 
an observer ; and the telescope might 
as well be in Japan. 

On the other hand, another denocai- 
national college has received the gift 
of a splendid observatory ; but no one 
has added a gift of money for a tele- 
scope and other instruments. So the 
prevailing system gives you at one 
college a useless telescope, and at 
another a useless observatory. 

I know of another denominational 
institution which has received a splen- 
did geological collection ; but as it has 
no provision for a geological laboratory, 
or for a geological professor, the col- 
lection, for all scientific purposes, is a 
mere illusion. 

I know another denominational 
institution, which received from a de- 
nominational friend a splendid her- 
barium ; but from the day it was 
received it has never been used, for 
the reason that no other member of the 
denomioation has provided a professor- 
ship of botany. 

I know another institution of this 
kind, which has received an excellent 
collection in mineralogy ; but all ap- 
peals from the denomination to which 
it belongs have failed to secure an 
endowed professorship of metallurgy; 
and it would be monej'' saved, had the 
collection never been taken out of tho 
earth. 

Compare this with the example [ 
have just mentioned. The nation 
gave a moderate grant for a univer- 
sity to the State of Micliigan : the 
State legislature added to it judi- 
ciously. Thus was built up one great 
institution. The result is, tliat from 
various parts of the State, and from 
other States, gifts have been aggre- 



and Advanced Education. 



483 



gated about the nucleus thus formed. 
Thus was provided both a telescope 
and an observatory ; thus has its 
library been enlarged ; thus were de- 
veloped its illustrative collections. 
They are a matter of State concern 
and State pride ; and individual gifts 
come in from all sides more and more 
to supplant public gifts. 

The same, in a less degree, may be 
seen in several other universities : the 
only difficulty in these cases is, that 
public gifts have been too small to 
give the public system a fair and full 
trial. 

But I argue next, that our existiny 
public school system leads logically 
ind necessarily to the endowment of 
advanced instruction. 

For years the prevalent American 
practice has divorced the primary and 
secondary education from advanced 
education. Never was a system more 
illogical ; never did a system more 
fully show its unreason by its results. 
When we attempt to divorce ad- 
vanced from preliminary education, we 
are simply persisting in cutting the 
whole mass of branches and boughs 
and blossoms of education from the 
trunk ; and wlien we succeed in rear- 
ing goodly trees by persistently saw- 
ing off all their upper growth, and 
leaving the bare trunk, then, and not 
till then, can we have goodly systems 
of primary and secondary public 
schools, wliile we cut off from them 
the wh'ole development of higher edu- 
cation. 

Again I cite the State of Michigan. 
Its university, in which its whole sys- 
tem of public instruction culminates, 
has shed light and life into its high 
schools, and those again into the great 
number of secondary and primary 
schools. The best graduates are con- 
stantly going into the teach erships of 
the high schools, and their best pupils 



into charge of the primary schools. 
These last, in their turn, send up their 
best men through intermediate grades 
to the university. The result is a 
system of which the whole State is 
becoming proud, and one which puts 
to shame the feeljle anarchy prevail- 
ing in the education of most of her 
sister States. 

[f there should be public provision 
for any education at all, it should be a 
good provision ; and thei^e can be no 
good provision for any part of a sys- 
tem of public instruction which does 
not" develop every part fully, and all 
,parts harmoniously. To be a good 
system, it must be a living system ; 
and it cannot be a living system, 
unless its growth be complete. If its 
highest parts are left to wither, its 
trunk and roots will wither also. 

Again : I argue that the existing 
system of public endowments for ad- 
vanced education in matters relating 
to the 7nilita,nj and naval service 
leads logically to public provision 
for advanced education in matters 
relating to the civil service of the 
nation. 

If the preservation of the national 
honor is the ground for public provis- 
ion in one case, it is the ground in the 
other. Nay, if the preservation of 
the national existence is the ground 
in one case, it is the ground not less 
in the other. The number in milita- 
ry and naval service is less than twen- 
ty thousand : the number of those in 
civil service, counting National and 
State officials, is probably ten times 
that number. 

See where the hap-hazard system 
of public advanced education, doled 
out to a great nation by various sects, 
has led us. From one end of the 
country to the other there is not a 
regular permanent provision for ad- 
vanced instruction in the history of 



484 



TJie National and State Governments 



the United States. Look the whole 
number of three hundred and sixty 
colleges through, and you do not find, 
save in one or two, any regular pro- 
vision for instruction in political 
economy and social science. Take 
tlie plainest results* as regards social 
science. Every year the cost is fear- 
ful. Nearly forty State legislatures, 
and nearly forty times forty county 
and local boards, dealing with matters 
relating to pauperism, crime, lunacy, 
idiocy, the care of the deaf, dumb, and 
blind, making provision regarding 
them at a cost of millions upon millions, 
and very rarely with any fundamen- 
tal study of the complicated questions 
involved. Yonder is England suffer- 
ing from errors in these respects made 
centuries ago : here are our States 
repeating many of the same errors. 

Take next the simple results as re- 
gards political science. Look at our 
national legislature, containing al- 
ways a large number of strong men 
and patriotic men, but the strongest 
of them often given up to theories 
which the most careful thinking of 
the world, and the world's experience 
as recorded in history, long since ex- 
ploded. 

But the analogy extends beyond 
the internal affairs of our Nation and 
States : it extends to our external rela- 
tions. I do not speak of the diplo- 
matic service, though the want of 
higher knowledge with reference to 
that has long been felt ; but I allude 
to an analogy of another sort forced 
upon us by these times. 

I start again with the premises 
universally conceded, that public pro- 
vision is necessary to fit men to take 
part in warfare by land and sea, to hold 
our country in the position she ought 
to occupy among modern nations. 

But the warfare to which men are 
educated at West Point and Annapo- 



lis is 'not the only warfare between 
modern States. 

The greatest modern warfare is 
rapidly becoming an industrial war- 
fare. Every great nation is recogniz- 
ing this. But the most striking thing 
about it is a change in methods. The 
old system of waging war by tariffs 
and bounties is yielding to the sys- 
tem of developing national taste and 
skill by teclmical education. That 
is the meaning of the great exposi- 
tions of industry of the last twenty- 
five years : that is the meaning of all 
the great institutions whicli modern 
States are providing for higher edu- 
cation in the sciences bearing upon 
the various industries, — education to 
enable nations to hold their own 
among modei'n States, — education in 
civil, mining, and mechanical engi- 
neering ; in the application of the 
natural and physical sciences to agri- 
culture and manufacture ; in arts of 
design as applied to the making of 
various fabrics. 

This warfare is real as the other. 
The army engaged in it is larger than 
in the other: it is on our side eight 
million strong; and the nation which 
leaves education regarding it to the 
driblets which can be wheedled out 
of individuals by sectarian appeals 
will find that it has neglected its 
highest duties, and abdicated some of 
its noblest functions. 

Again : I argue that not only does a , 
true regard for the material prosper- 
ity of the nation demand a more reg- 
ular and thorough public provision 
for advanced education, hut that our 
highest jwlitical interests demand it. 

From all sides come outcries against 
the debasement of American politics, 
and especially against gross material 
corruption. No doubt, great part of 
these cries are stimulated by scandal- 
hunters and sensation-mongers ; still 



and Advanced Education. 



485 



enough remains to give much food for 
serious thought. 

Now, I assert, that, as a rule, our 
public men who have received an ad- 
vanced education have not yielded to 
gross corruption. Understand the 
assertion. It is not that men who 
have not had the advantages of an 
advanced education yield generally 
to corrupt influences, — far from it ; 
some of the noblest opponents of cor- 
ruption we have had have been men 
debarred by early poverty from thor- 
ough education, — but what I assert 
is simply this : go among the men 
who disgrace our country by gross 
corruption, — whether in city, state, 
or national councils, — and you find 
the great majority of them of the 
class that has received just education 
enough to enter into the struggle for 
place or pelf, and not enough to 
appreciate higher considerations. 

The preliminary education which 
many of our strongest men have re- 
ceived leaves them simply beasts of 
prey : it has simply sharpened their 
claws, and whetted their tusks. But a 
higher education, whether in science, 
literature, or history, not only sharpens 
a man's faculties, but gives him new 
exemplars and ideals. His struggle 
for place and pelf is, as a rule, modi- 
fied by considerations to which a man 
of lower education is very often a 
stranger. He is lifted up to a plane 
from which he can look down upon suc- 
cess in corruption with the scorn it 
deserves. The letting-down in charac- 
ter of our National and State councils 
has notoriously increased, just as the 
predominance of men of advanced 
education in those councils has de- 
creased. President Barnard's admi- 
rable paper, showing the relatively 
diminishing number of men of ad- 
vanced education in our public sta- 
tions, decade by decade, marks no less 



the rise, decade by decade, of material 
corruption. This is not mere con- 
comitancy : there is a relation here 
of cause and efi'ect. 

If we are to have more statesmen 
of that high type which is alone wor- 
thy of a republic, we must have bet- 
ter provision for educating the young 
men of rude strength, who are taking 
hold of public affairs in all parts of 
our country, and especially in the 
great States of the West. . We must 
have an education provided for, that 
shall lift them above mere mammon- 
worship, into those realms where the 
great thoughts of great men give the 
atmosphere in which can best be cul- 
tivated a sense of duty to God and to 
country. To give better men to pub- 
lic stations, you must have provisions 
for instructing our strongest young 
men, which shall lift them above the 
prevalent idea of life among such 
multitudes of our successful men, — 
the idea that life is a game of grasp- 
ing and griping for forty years, with 
a whine for God's mercy at the end 
of it. 

And, finally, I insist that it is a 
duty of society to itself, a duty ivhich 
it cannot throw off, to see that the 
stock of talent and genius in each 
generation have chance for develop- 
ment, that it may he added to the 
world! s stock, and, aid in the world's 
work. 

Of all State treasures, the genius 
and talent of citizens are the most 
precious. That arch Bohemian, Sala, 
said that in no country is there so 
much genius and talent " lying 
around loose " as in America. Now, 
it is just this genius and talent, which, 
as all history shows, private capacity, 
and the law of supply and demand, 
will not develop. 

But I am met here, first, by an 
undue extension of the laissez faire 



486 



The National and Sfate GovernmenU 



argument. It is said that the best 
policy is to leave the building-up of 
such institutions entirely to private 
hands; that such a plan educates the 
people to give, makes them self-re- 
liant. 

The latest form of this argument 
Wii:- put forth in the National Associ- 
ation of Teachers last year at Elmira. 
in a speech by President Eliot of 
Harvard. 

Now, I do not yet take up the ques- 
tion of a single national university at 
the national capital ; but when the 
distinguished president of Harvard 
College condemns by implication, as 
in the speech to which I have re- 
ferred, all public provision for ad- 
vanced instruction, whether by Nation 
or State, we all have the right to 
stand amazed. At its very beginning, 
the university over which he pre- 
sides had aid from the State in which 
it stands; and it has not been slow to 
accept public aid at various periods 
since. In these latter days, its 
greatest glory, its museum of natural 
science, is largely the result of con- 
stant application to the legislature 
of Massachusetts. The whole coun- 
try has rejoiced that the State of 
Massachusetts has had the practical 
good sense thus to grant funds to 
carry on the great work of Prof. 
Agassiz at Harvard; and they rejoiced 
also when the liberality of the State 
stimulated a noble growth of private 
liberality. 

But this is not all. So far as the 
jmblic has learned, there stands in 
the annals of that university no 
record of any rejection of favors, 
even from the National Government. 
The benefits accruing to that institu- 
tion from the Coast Survey are well 
known ; and when rich spoils came to 
it from the dredging expedition of 
"The Hassler," a national ship, I 



remember no Spartan voice raised to 
repel them. 

But grant that the argument 
against public aid is good at Harvard, 
is it good anywhere else in this coun- 
try ? It certainly cannot be held 
good at Yale, or at Dartmouth, or at 
Brown, or at Rutgers, or at the Uni- 
versity of Vermont, — institutions 
which received the national grant of 
1862 for promoting the application of 
science to industrj^, and are milking 
a most noble return for the gift. 

Grant that Harvard can now dis- 
pense with public aid (although her 
recent history looks so little like it), 
it does not at all follow that the other 
institutions of the country can dis- 
pense with it. Close under the 
shadow of the great palaces and 
warehouses of a metropolitan city, 
that institution, to the joy of us all, 
is the recipient of splendid gifts from 
princely merchants and scholars. 
But how few of our colleges have the 
advantage of being near so great an 
accumulation of capital ! 

Nor is this all. Harvard can aiFord 
to speak complacently to her young 
sisters, for she is enjoying the accumu- 
lations of two hundred years. But 
are the Western States to wait two 
hundred years ? Here is the whole 
question. The prospect held out to 
the younger States is, that those of 
their colleges which happen to be near 
great centres of wealth may, in a 
century or two, arrive at the position 
which Harvard has now attained. 

But I come to the second part of 
the objection : Is it necessary that 
public provision be withheld in order 
that private persons may give, and 
that public spirit may thus be culti- 
vated ? Even if it be so, I fail 'to see 
force in the argument. As well might 
President Eliot argue against any 
public provision for policemen, in 



and Advanced Education. 



487 



order that individuals va^y toughen 
their muscles in fighting ruifiSans ; or 
against any public provision for 
prisons, in order that individuals 
may sharpen their minds in outwit- 
ting thieves. The history of the 
private gifts for education, crystallized 
about the various public gifts, and 
especially about that of 1862, shows 
that well-directed public bounty stim- 
ulates private bounty. It shows that 
Americans will give where they see 
something well established to which 
it seems worth while to give. *' To 
him that hath shall be given " is the 
rule for advanced education. 

The laissez faire argument is good 
against government provision for 
those things which private persons 
may be fairly expected to establish 
and maintain from expectation of 
gain; but all history shows that ad- 
vanced education is not one of those 
tilings. The greatest modern apostle 
of the laissez faire principle, John 
Stuart Mill, on this and other 
grounds, especially excludes educa- 
tion in all its grades from the opera- 
tion of the laissez faire principle. 
Says Mr. Mill, — 



"But there are other things of the 
wortli of which tlie demand of the market 
is by uo means a test, — tilings of which the 
utility does not consist in ministering to 
inclinations, nor in serving the daily uses 
of life, and the want of which is least felt 
■where the need is greatest. This is pecu- 
liarly true of those things which are chietly 
usefid as tending to raise the character of 
human beings. ... It Avill continually 
happen on the voluntai'y system, that, the 
end not being desired, the means will not 
be provided at all, or that, the persons re- 
quiring improvement having an imperfect 
or altogether erroneous conception of what 
they want, the supply called forth by the 
demand of the market will be anj^ thing 
but vyhat is really required. . . . Education, 
therefore, is one of those things which it is 
\ admissible in principle that a government 
should provide for the people. The case is 
one to which the reasons of the non-inter- 



ference principle do not necessarily or uni- 
versally extend." 

And again : — 

"In the matter of education, the in- 
tervention of government is justifiable, 
because the case is not c ne in -which the 
interest and jiulgment of the consumer 
are a suflicient security for the goodness 
of the commodity." i 

But it is said that universities pub- 
licly endowed would overshadow the 
existing colleges. Doubtless this 
would be the case with many of the 
weakest ones in the newer States ; 
but is that a hardship ? If there is 
any thing in the matter of education 
for which Michigan and California 
and Wisconsin and Minnesota have 
reason to bless their early statesmen, 
it is just this creation of State uni- 
versities, which have overshadowed 
the whole corps of little sectarian 
colleges and universities, or rather 
rendered them impossible. 

But while the whole brood of 
feeble colleges must thus be weakened, 
I iirmly believe that the really strong 
colleges and universities, even those 
which have grown up under the old 
system, would be greatly strengthened 
thereby. This is not mere -theory. 
Look at the history of advanced in- 
struction during the last ten years. 
Several of our older institutions were, 
ten years ago, in a state of torpor, or 
of very moderate progress, to say the 
least. What was the beginning of a 
new order of things at Harvard ? 
Kotoriously the famous pamphlet of 
Dr. Hedge, exhibiting the system and 
work of the University of Michigan. 
From that publicly-endowed institu- 
tion in the West came a very strong 
impulse to university-growth in the 
East. Tlhe interest in university 
progress at Harvard and Yale, and 
Wesleyan and Amherst, and Prince- 

1 Mill, Political Economy, vol. ii. book v. 



488 The Xational and Slate Governments 

ton 'and Union, and Lafayette and tions and churches, and to the other 

Washington-Lee Colleges, has un- good appliances accessible in a Chris- 

QUPstioiial)l_y been aided by the spirit tian country. 

thus aroused. What is wanted in But it is said, " Your legislatures 
this country is examples which will and j^^blic authorities will manage 
stain[) into the mind of our people such trusts badl)', and appoint unfit 
what a true university ought to be, persons to professorships." 
Show an example of this sort to the Some will do so at first ; most will 
friends of the really strong old col- not. Save in one or two cases, no such 
leges, so that they can really under- charge can be made in the whole his- 
stand it, and they will give liberally tory of State management of over forty 
to build up their older colleges as State universities and colleges, and a 
nobly as any new ones. Let any still greater number of normal schools. 
State develop its university never so Nor can this charge be made against 
high, .the alumni of Harvard and the management by the United States 
Yale, and Columbia and Brow^i, and of the national academies at West- 
Princeton and Union and Rutgers, Point and Annapolis, or of the Smith- 
and others of like vigor, will not let sonian Institution, under the very 
their own colleges be behindhand. eaves of the national Capitol. 

Still another argument in opposi- Favoritism and mismanagement are 
tion runs as follows: ''No institution likely to be far greater in the close 
can be Christian, unless there be some corporations of denominational col- 
denominational dogma as its basis ; a leges, each too weak to live without 
publicly-endowed institution cannot propitiating the '' leading men of the 
accept any denominatiotial basis : denomination." 

therefore it will be infidel and atheis- But it is said, "The denomina- 

tic ; " or, to put it in shorter form, '*' a tional colleges have given to the 

college must be sectarian to be Chris- countrj^ many strong men." True ; 

tian." but what does this prove ? Extend 

To say nothing of other difficulties, the argument a little. A simple 

one fatal difficulty with this argument printing-office education has given to 

is, that it proves too much. As Bishop the country many strong men, — such 

McQuaid of Bochester recently urged m^n as Franklin and Greeley; but 

with great cogency, this argument, if does it follow that we should have no 

good for any thing against institutions other agency for developing the latent 

of advanced instruction, isfar sti-onger talent and genius of the country? 
against our whole common-school sj^s- Tiie colleges have developed much 

tern. The simplest view of the sub- talent for the pulpit, bar, and forum; 

ject shows us that there is far more but we need yet stronger agencies for 

reason for requiring sectarian schools developing yet more; and the proof 

for children, who cannot provide for is to be found in Dr. Barnard's statis- 

their own religious wants, and who tics, which show the declining num- 

are at the most tender and impressi- ber, proportionatelj'-, of college-bred 

ble period, than for young men, whose men in all our public positions, execu- 

fundamental ideas are alresldy formed, tive, legislative, and judicial, 
to a great extent, and who have free Besides this, our needs are vastly 

access to multitudes of devoted cler- increased and extended. Our modern 

gymen, and to the Christian associa- civilizatiou demands now what very 



and Advanced Education. 



489 



few of our colleges and universities 
are prepared to give, — thorough train- 
ing in civil, mechanical, and mining 
engineering, in architecture, in chem- 
isfcr}' applied to agriculture and man- 
ufactures, in all those sciences and 
arts which are building modern civili- 
zation. The little college with four 
or five professors is no longer enough. 
To meet this modern need, we want 
institutions most thoroughly and 
largely equipped with laboratories, 
libraries, museums, experimental 
grounds, observatories, and the like, 
which demand great concentration of 
means in a few places. 

But it is said, " Institutions for 
advanced instruction are for the 
wealthy, for rich men's sons, and 
not for the poor." 

Nothing could be more wide of the 
fact. The rich man is indeed vastly 
interested indirectly ; for thorough 
provision for advanced education will 
raise up a thoughtful class of men, 
who are the natural enemies of all 
the wild theories which tend to deso- 
late society, or disturb public prosi^eri- 
ty ; but, if any person more than 
another is fully and directly interested, 
it is the poor man. The rich man 
can send his son to another State or 
to another country ; the poor man 
cannot. The doctrine I advocate is 
the onl}' one, which, in many parts of 
our country, can insure a worthj"- edu- 
cation to the sons of poor men. The 
whole experience of the world shows, 
that from the ranks of poverty comes 
b}' far the greatest part of the genius 
and talent and energy of the world. 
In the great majority of our States, 
this great class, disciplined by pov- 
erty, have no chance for any ad- 
vanced education in applied science, 
in civil engineering, in mechanical 
engineering, in mining engineering, 
and kindred departments, and very 



little chance in any other, unless there 
be public endowments for advanced 
instruction. 

And now what should our practical 
policy be in carrying out the general 
principle I have advocated ? Let us 
see if we cannot get out of the realm 
of theory into tlie realm of practice. 

And first, as to practical dealings- 
vnth the question, in the newer States. 
Now, there is one very fortunate thing 
in the whole matter; and that is, as 
regards public provision for education 
in the new States, there is already a 
National and State policy, based on 
the right principle, and tending to 
the right direction. It has not been 
carried out with sufficient liberality 
or continuity ; still it has always been 
in one direction, and that is, I think, 
the right direction. In accordance 
with this policy, the Congress of the 
United States gave the newer 
States, — 

First, a grant of land to serve as a 
nucleus fund for primary and second- 
ary instruction. 

Second, Congress gave, the States 
a grant to serve as a nucleus fund for 
university instruction. 

Third, Congress has given to the 
new States, as well as to the old, a 
grant to serve as a nucleus fund for 
instruction, especiallj' in sciences bear- 
ing on the great industries. This 
National and State policy, thus in 
harmony, has begun to be supple- 
mented by an individual policy. Al- 
ready individuals are beginning to 
aggregate gifts about the funds thus 
provided by the Nation and the 
State. 

Here, then, is a policy distinct and 
consistent. So far as it has been 
carried out, it has woiked well. The 
only difficulty is, that it has been 
carried out too slowly and timidlyj 
what I advocate is, that it be carried 



490 • The National and State Governments 

out firmly and logical!}''. I would whose whole system of puolic action 
have Congress strengthen the foun- consists, not in promoting a practica- 
dations it has laid in the States, ble plan, but in groaning over and 
thoughtfully and liberallj^, in view scolding at every thing supposed to 
of the vast populations that are to contravene ultra doctrines of non- 
reside in those States, and in view of interference and the ultra lalssez 
the absidute necessity of having fc.trong faire phrases; but it is a police- 
centres of enlightenment in those vast ah-eady adopted, and is the only one 
populations. which can give advanced education to 

Next, as to State policy. I would our great new States. 
have it go in the same direction as Let me sum up the whole case ' 
heretofore, but with a liberality and based on facts presented in public 
steadiness showing far more fore- reports, which I ask jow as thought- 
sight. I would have eacli of those ful men lo ponder. Remember, then, 
States build up higher upon the foun- that in not one of our States, outside ^ 
dations laid by national grants their the original thirteen, has there yet 
public institutions for advanced in- been established by private enter- 
struction as distinguished from pri- prise or sectarian zeal a college or 
vate sectarian institutions. I would university with a faculty approaching 
have each State build up the one completeness as to numbers, or with 
institution under its control, rather a general equipment which reaches 
than the twenty under the control of nlediocrit3^ In the whole number of 
conferences and dioceses and synods such sectarian institutions, there is 
and councils and consistories and not one complete faculty, not one 
presbyteries, and denominational as- library, laboratorj', observatory, or 
sociations of various sects. I would ilUistrative collection, worthy of even 
have Michigan develop more com- the third rank, even judging by our 
pletely her excellent normal school American standard. This is the out- 
at Ypsilanti, and her agricultural come of nearly a century of effort, 
college at Lansing, and add a de- under the principle of scattering re- 
partment of technolog}', and a mining sources for advanced education in 
school, to her noble universitj' at accordance with the demands of sec- 
Ann Arbor. I would have Illinois tarianism, rather than concentrating 
strengthen her admirable industrial them in accordance with the plans of 
university at Champaign; and Ar- statesmanship. 

kansas, hers at Lafayette. I would So much for the great new States. 
have Missouri strengthen her State Turn now to the older States. 
university at Columbia, and her min- What should he our pollci/ irith 
ing school at Holla ; and Iowa them ? Wise statesmanship dictates 
strengthen her State college at Ames; that we be not fettered by a single 
and Minnesota, her State university theor}' or doctrine, no matter how good 
at St. Anthony; and California go in the abstract. The older States, hav- 
en, as she recently has done so liber- ing had more time for developing insti- 
ally, and strengthen her universitj'- at tutions for advanced instruction, and 
Berkeley; and Kentucky, hers at not having scattered resources with 
Ashland; and so with the rest. utter prodigality as the new States 
This is a policy which may be have done, have built up a small 
groaned over or sighed at by those number of colleges and universities 



and Advanced Education. 



491 



\ 



of real strength. On their founda- 
tion I would have public grants and 
private gifts combined. Here, too, 
fortunatel}', there is ♦a well-defined 
National polic}'', and, to some extent, 
a State policy. 

The ISTational Government acted in 
accordance with it when it gave the 
grant of lands for general and scien- 
tific and industrial education in 
1862 ; and the States acted in accord- 
ance with it, when they appropri- 
ated that grant, — Connecticut to 
Yale, New Hampshire to Dartmouth, 
Vermont to the Vermont University, 
New Jersey to Kutgers, Massachu- 
setts to the State Agricultural Col- 
lege and Institute of Technology, 
Rhode Island to Brown University. 
The Scripture rule in this case is, " to 
him that hath shall be given ; " the 
scientific rule is, let there be a "sur- 
vival of the fittest;" and the plain 
rule of common-sense — whether in 
nation or State, whether in old States 
or new, whether for public or private 
gifts — is, for primary education, dif- 
fusion ; for advanced education, con- 
centration of resources. 

And, as to the general application 
of these rules, the history of all civil- 
ized nations, and especially our own, 
shows that the thoughtful statesman- 
ship of each generation should pro- 
vide for the .primary', secondary, and 
advanced education of each genera- 
tion. 

Accepting this principle, the im- 
mediate care should evidently be to 
strengthen \>^ public action the best 
foundations for advanced education 
which we already have; and although 
I am not here as the advocate of a 
single national university, yet I may 
say, that should the National Govern- 
ment take a few of the strongest in 
various parts of the country, and, by 
greater endowments still, make them 



national universities; or should it 
create one or more new ones worthy 
of the nation, placing one of them at 
the national capital, where the vast 
libraries, museums, and laboratories 
of various sorts now existing may 
be made of use for advanced instruc- 
tion, and where the university could 
act directly and powerfully for good 
in sending graduates admirably pre- 
pared into the very heart and centre 
of our national "civil service, to ele- 
vate and strengthen it, — I believe, 
in spite of pessimists and doctrinaires, 
that the ret^ult would tell for good 
upon the whole country. 

I do not enter into details of any 
particular plan : for this I refer you 
to the thoughtful papers of Prof. 
Hoyt and Senator Howe. My aim 
has been simply to lay down and 
illustrate the great principles which 
must serve as a foundation in this 
whole matter. 

And now a word in answer to the 
objections recently put forth by Dr. 
McCosh. 

The doctor first objects to the term 
"sectarian college," and .asks what I 
mean by it. I can easily answer 
him. A sectarian college is a college 
controlled by any single sect, or com- 
bination of sects. Sometimes this/' 
control is exercised by giving ^e 
favored sect a majority of trus$;;e6s or 
professors ; sometimes by^eqniring 
the president to be a, clergyman of a 
peculiar sect ; so^iietimes by organiz- 
ing the corttrolling body, at tha 
beginning, in the interest of the sect, 
and then keeping it a close corpora- 
tion. Unfortunately, the answer to 
the learned doctor's question is writ- 
ten over the whole history of Ameri- 
can education, and in letters very 
big and black. From the days when 
Henry Dunster, the first president of 
Harvard College, a devoted scholar, 



492 



The National and State Governments 



and earnest man, was driven from 
his seat with ignominy and cruelty, 
becanse, as Cotton Mather said after- 
wards, he had "fallen into the briars 
of anti-pedobaptism," the sectarian 
sjiirit has been the worst foe of ad- 
vanced education. 

But, if the doctor thinks examples 
of this sort too old, I will point him 
to some well known in our time. 
One of the most honored college 
presidents of New York was driven 
out of his professorship of natural 
philosoph}' in a Kew-England college 
because he was an Episcopalian. One 
of the most honored college presi- 
dents of New England was driven 
awaj^ from a professorship of Greek in 
a New- York college because he was 
a Unitarian. One of the most re- 
nowned college presidents in the 
Western States was excluded from a 
2:)rofessorship in the State of New 
York because he was a Presbyterian. 
One of the main university presiden- 
cies in New England remained in 
these latter years vacant for a long 
time. Why ? There were scholars, 
jurists, statesmen, in that Common- 
wealtli, who would have done honor to 
the position. Why were they not 
called? Simply because the statute 
of the university required the pre- 
siding officer to be a Baptist. One of 
the most important colleges in the 
State of New York rejected one of 
the best modern chemists because he 
was not of the required sect : a noted 
college in a neighboring State re- 
jected one of our most noted astron- 
omers and mathematicians for the 
same reason. Na}', within a few 
years I have had personal knowledge, 
as a trustee of the CQ,llege concerned, 
of the following case : a college had 
suffered long for want of a professor 
of rhetoric and English literature, 
upon a foundation already endowed. 



A man of the required sect was at 
last found admirably fitted ; but this 
man was rejected. Why? Simply 
because he was not of a particular 
party in that particular sect. Does 
the doctor wish to know what an Tin- 
sectarian university is ? I point him 
to the charter given by the State of 
New York to the university which I 
have the honor to serve. It contains 
the following clauses: "Persons of 
any religious sect, or of no religious 
sect, shall be equally eligible to all 
offices and appointments." And 
again, "No person shall be accepted 
or rejected as trustee, professor, or 
student, on account of any religious 
or political views which he may or 
may not entertain." 

But Dr. McCosh praises Yale Col- 
lege, and asks whether I consider 
that a sectarian college. Let me say 
here to the doctor, that, while I may 
be willing to sit at his feet to learn 
some other duties, I cannot acknowl- 
edge him as my instructor regarding 
my filial duty to my Alma Mater. 
Among all her sons, no one loves her 
or respects her more than I ; and my 
love and respect for her grow with 
the years, because I see that she is 
nobly working out of the sectarian 
fetters which her earlj' history threw 
about her. She has appointed sever- 
al men to professorships without com- 
pelling them to submit to any tests 
of orthodoxy whatever. In her 
faculty may to-day be found men 
utterly at variance with the theology 
which she has been supposed to rep- 
resent. 

She has never lost her presence of 
mind in A'iew of Darwinism; nor has 
she ever allowed a scientific profes- 
sorship to remain vacant for fear that 
she might find in her faculty a be- 
liever in evolution. / 

The doctor expressed fear iho/ 



/ 



and Advianced Education. 



493 



trouble might; arise from difference in 
belief afn'ong professors, and tbouglit 
some ^ one religious body must be in 
control. To show how little he un- 
derstands the problem as it has been 
wrought out in this countr}'-, I can 
point him to the University of Vir- 
ginia, the University of Michigan, 
the Cornell University, the Indus- 
trial University of Illinois, the nor- 
■ mal schools and national colleges in 
the various States, which have gone 
on perfectly easily and smoothly 
under the system I advocate, and 
with infinitely less of religious quar- 
relling than has taken place in 
several colleges under the guidance 
of a particular sect. 

Again : the doctor objects to any 
dependence upon State and National 
aid, because, he says, their officers 
would be obliged to present their 
cases to the State legislature, and 
there would be " lobbyii^g ; " and he 
draws a picture of the wretchedness 
arising from university officers taking 
part in this business. But there is 
another picture far more wretched : 
it is the picture of college presidents 
and professors inflicting themselves 
ad nauseam upon the pulpits and 
parlors of their particular denomina- 
tion "to present the claims" of their 
special sectarian college ; the picture 
of college officials paying court at the 
tables of rich members of the sect to 
catcli some drippings for their re- 
spective colleges ; the picture of pro- 
fessors of*colleges driven to watch 
for legacies at the hands of aged 
widows and spinsters. This is a pic- 
ture infinitely more sad than that of 
the college officer as a citizen present- 
ing the claims of advanced education 
to the Educational Committee of 
^ the legislature, or to its various 
\. members, and enforcing upon them 
Nthe duty that the State owes in. the 



education of its citizens. And, 
finally, the doctor gained some ap- 
plause, apparently from undergradu- 
ates collected in the hall when he 
spoke, by the assertion that American 
colleges and universities send out 
graduates as well prepared as do the 
great foreign universities. The 
doctor possibly mistakes me. I made 
no reference to the smaller queen's 
colleges of Ireland. If he says that 
the scholarship of their students at 
graduation is lower than that in our 
American colleges, I shall take his 
word for it, and pity Ireland all the 
more. But if he meant that our 
American universities, any of them, 
graduate men on an equality, as 
regards scholarship, with the great 
universities of the Old World, I 
will not put assertion against asser- 
tion, though my experience among 
those universities at home and abroad 
as a student (I state it simply as a 
matter of fact) is greater than his 
own, but I will simply point to facts 
which utterly disprove his asser- 
tion. If his assertion be true, why 
is it that a stream of the foremost 
scholars of our foremost universities 
sets steadily toward the great univer- 
sities of the Old V/orld ? Why do 
our best graduates of Harvard, Yale, 
Michigan, Princeton, Wesleyan, Cor- 
nell, and Columbia, and all the rest, 
constantljr go abroad to perfect them- 
selves in these same studies ? Why 
was it that the late presidents of 
Harvard and Yale, and their present 
pi'esidents, both pursued their studies 
abroad after graduation at home ? 
Why is it that almost every professor 
of note in our leading colleges, in 
every important department, has 
perfected his studies abroad after 
graduating at home ? To provoke 
the applause of undergraduates, Dr. 
McCosh's assertion was good enough, 



494 



and he appears to have learned early 
how to minister to the American 
appetite for praise ; but as a statement 
soberly made before a body anxious 
to get at the truth of the matter, and 
to do sometliiag to help on advanced 
education in the country, the state- 
ment seems to be utterly unworthy. 

And one more question may be 
asked, Wliat shall be done with this 
great midtitude of denominational 
colleges ah-eady existing ? I answer 
to that, Let them become intermediate 
colleges, holding a place like that of 
the great English schools or the 
German gymnasia, between the lower 
preparatory schools and the universi- 
ties. As such they could render a 
vast service to the country. 

There would be no lessening in 
their dignity, or in the position of 
those who manage them. Our mother- 
country gives her highest honors to 
tho*p intermediate colleges, and to 



those who govern them. Eton and 
Harrow and Eugby are places of 
pilgrimage ; and that galaxy in which 
Hawtrey and Arnold and Temple 
stood is one of the glories of our race. 
Nor is our own countrj' without ex- 
amples. Any president of college 
or university might prize the fame 
of Taylor of Andover. 

And now, in closing, let me present 
the two practical conclusions from 
my argument : — 

First, In the older States public 
and pr'iuate aid should he concen- 
trated upon a small number of the 
broadest and strongest foundations 
already laid. 

Second, In the newer States, 
State aid should he regularly and 
liberally given to State institutions, 
for the highest literary, scientific, 
and industrial instruction, to fully 
equip them, and to keep them free 
from sectarian control. 



A 



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